


Family Protector

by LittleSweetCheeks



Series: If I'd Known... I never... [15]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: F/M, Family, Following In Footsteps, protector - Freeform, remembering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-21
Updated: 2018-07-21
Packaged: 2019-06-14 02:24:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15378651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleSweetCheeks/pseuds/LittleSweetCheeks
Summary: Jack found himself understanding what must have motivated his father.





	Family Protector

Jack knew, he’d known his entire life at whatever level of understanding he’d had at any given time. He knew about his dad’s job and eventually he knew all of the details of his dad’s scars and his mother’s death. He knew about the nightmares and the drinking and everything else. Once he’d gotten old enough, he’d researched the team and the cases and anything else he could get his hands on and, in turns, he was both thankful people like his father existed to chase those monsters, and sad that it was his own father that had to leave to do the chasing.

As a boy, he’d thought of his dad as a superhero. The person who swooped in and saved the day. As a teen he hated that his father’s job robbed him of his friends and his life. As an adult…

As an adult, he hated that the ghosts of that job robbed his father from him entirely. First as echoes in the older Hotchner’s mind, breaking him down and leaving him a shell of a man and then later, robbing him from this plane of existence entirely.

But until this very second, Jack had never really understood. He’d never understood what drove his father to run in when others were running out, never understood what compelled him to put his own life on the line.

He did now.

He understood that his father had been doing his best to protect him from evil.

Keeping his right hand steady while his left arm remained curled around the tiny form of his newborn daughter, Jack exhaled carefully. Against his calves he could feel his son, Aaron, cowering from the man in the doorway. The man who’d broken down the door intent on killing the whole family. Jack could hear his wife whimpering, but pushed the sound from his mind.

“You so much as twitch toward my family and I shoot.” His voice was calm to the point of menacing. He hoped it soothed his son, knowing his father was protecting him.

The man smirked at the young family and the young man and lunged.

_‘if I’d known, Dad…’_ Jack exhaled and pulled the trigger three times in quick succession. _‘I swear I never would have wondered if you loved me… Now I know. You fought because of your love for me.’_

 


End file.
